Ubuntu gains the support of China Unicom

Details: James Barton; Category: Enterprise Ecosystems; 12 July 2013; 6442 views

China Unicom has signed up to the Ubuntu Carrier Advisor Group, providing a welcome lift to the nascent platform. Unicom is China’s number two operator with over 250 million subscribers...

China Unicom has signed up to the Ubuntu Carrier Advisor Group, providing a welcome lift to the nascent platform. Unicom is China’s number two operator with over 250 million subscribers.

The Carrier Advisory Group was established last month by Ubuntu and originally comprised of the platform’s major backers: Deutsche Telekom, EE, Korea Telecom, Telecom Italia, LG U+, Portugal Telecom, SK Telecom and an unconfirmed Spanish operator referred to as the “leading Spanish international carrier” – Telefonica is a likely guess.

The Group has attracted support in Asia from Unicom as well as Indonesian mobile internet provider Smartfren. Li Xingxin, an employee of Unicom’s terminal research and support centre, said: “Ubuntu can be an exciting new platform for the Chinese market, offering a brand new user experience that balances user simplicity with operator requirements.”

Becoming part of the Group gives members early access to new information about Ubuntu and compatible devices, plus a “period of exclusivity to ship Ubuntu in their markets”. Interested parties have until the end of the month to join.

Ubuntu evidently has a fairly strong support base among operators, but no mobile vendors have yet announced a commercial device compatible with the mobile version of the OS. This puts it on the back foot against rival Mozilla Firefox, which has not only already launched devices powered by its new platform, but also has stronger operator and vendor support.

However, support will likely strengthen for Ubuntu as both operators and vendors are keen to ensure that Google’s Android platform does not become too dominant, thereby strengthening the internet giant’s influence in the mobile space.